As I write this, I’m enjoying one of these cookies with a cup of coffee, and y’all. I don’t even really like carrot cake, but these things are good. These Carrot Cake Cookies have got me re-evaluating things. Carrot cake is essentially a spice cake with cream cheese frosting, so why wouldn’t I love it?? Sugar and spice is my jam! What else have I been missing out on???
If only there was something equivalent to these cookies to make me realize I love things like vegetables and cardio.
ABOUT THESE COOKIES
SUGAR: If you look at the ingredient list, you’ll notice there are three different types of sugar going on here. And yeah, that’s kind of a lot. I adapted these from my thick and soft snickerdoodles, which use granulated sugar and powdered sugar in the dough to give them that thick and soft texture. For these carrot cake cookies, I split the granulated sugar amount in half and did half granulated sugar, half light brown sugar. BUT. If you don’t want to do three different kinds of sugar, or you find that you have one and not the other, you could sub more granulated sugar for the light brown, or the other way around. So you could do 1 cup granulated and 1/2 cup powdered, or 1 cup light brown and 1/2 cup powdered. I hope this makes sense! The cookies will still taste good any way you spin it!
PECANS: These cookies have 1/2 cup chopped pecans in the dough, but if you don’t like pecans or nuts in your baked goods (I typically don’t!), you can simply leave them out.
GRATED CARROT: There’s 1/2 cup grated carrot in this recipe, and I’d suggest using a grater with smaller holes as opposed to larger holes. These cookies bake for about 8 minutes, and I feel like that isn’t really enough time for bigger pieces of carrot to get soft enough while baking. If you were baking a cake for 15 to 18-ish minutes, that gives them more time to soften up while baking, you know? You don’t actually want cookies with crunchy bits of carrots in them. (Or maybe this is just me, I’m new to liking carrot cake things!)
COOKIE SCOOP SIZE: I used a large cookie scoop that holds 4 tablespoons. This gave me about 14 large cookies. You can absolutely use whatever size cookie scoop that you have! If you use a smaller cookie scoop, you’ll be able to fit more cookies on each baking sheet (and might need a third), but you’ll want to bake the cookies for a minute or two less.
Happy baking!
Carrot Cake Cookies
Ingredients
Carrot Cake Cookies
- 1 cup unsalted butter softened
- ½ cup packed light brown sugar
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 large eggs
- 3 tbsp milk
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup powdered su ar
- 1 tbsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
- ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
- ¼ tsp ground ginger
- 1 tsp salt
- ½ cup grated carrot
- ½ cup chopped pecans
Cream Cheese Frosting
- 1 8-oz block cream cheese
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 5 cups powdered sugar
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350°F and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Cream butter and granulated sugar on medium speed with a mixer until combined and fluffy. Add vanilla and eggs; mix until just combined.
- Whisk together flour, powdered sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and salt. Add half of flour mixture to the butter mixture. Mix on low speed until just combined, and then medium speed until completely combined. Repeat with second half of flour mixture. Add grated carrot and pecans and mix until they’re evenly distributed throughout the dough.
- Scoop dough onto the prepared baking sheet, arranging about 2-inches apart. (I got 7 cookies on each baking sheet.)
- Bake cookies for 7 to 8 minutes, or until crisp around the edges and set in the middle. Let cookies cool on pans for a few minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
- To make the frosting, beat cream cheese and vanilla in the bowl of a stand mixer until smooth. Add half of the powdered sugar and mix on low until mostly combined, then medium-high speed until completely combined. Repeat with second half of powdered sugar.
- Spread frosting on cooled cookies and sprinkle with cinnamon and chopped pecans for garnish.
- Enjoy!
Notes
Super tasty. The classic carrot cake flavor with cream cheese frosting as well. Wow! Plus they are thick and chewy. 🙂
These look delicious. The recipe states 1/2 teaspoon of pecans. Do you mean 1/2 cup?
Ahh, yes! So sorry about that, but thanks for pointing it out. It’s been corrected!